Canada versus USA

Wondering what your feeling are on the differences between Canadian Fire Departments and American Fire Departments? Are there things we as Canadians should be doing which the Americans are already doing? How can we improve?

What differences?

The difference is they have more large cities than we do! Which in turn results in higher call volume and more incidents. Other than that I have worked with firefighters from the United States and they do the same job as we do. Slight differences in some techniques but the same could be said about other fire departments in Canada. Lets not turn this into who is better than who thread.

Both organizations are based on the para-military model The British military in our case and the American in the US, so naturally there will be those differences. Other then that each Dept has its own idiosyncrasies. My Dept probably operates quite differently then our counterparts in Victoria 4000 miles away

Abrouwer, are there some differences you would like to point out, or some other questions about techniques you have heard?

Other than fire fighting it is pretty simple - departments are built around the jobs they can handle. Thats why each department is different or has other ideas on how to do things. The other thing is the lack of mandatory training (Canada and the US). Without a set quideline that departments have to adhere to you will see all sorts of different response models.

Canada vs. USA

I don't think it is a matter of diversity, I think it is more based around supply versus demand. The US have a much higher population than Canada and each department will have a higher demand for some of the services required than Canadian departments. Our department covers approximately 600 square miles of land and a population of around 7000. We average 85 calls per year. The same department in the US could have a population base of 3-4 times larger in the same land area. This would increase your call volume greatly and demand more training, equipment, and manpower to deal with the volume of calls.

Social / Economic factor's

I attended a Grow-Op Clan lab awareness session last night put on by the Calgary FD Hazmat team. (great presentation by the way)

The volume's of these types of calls in Canada appeared to be significantly less than what similar juristictions in the US were.

I'm wondering how many medical assist / hazmat calls are generated due to drug use and production? Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton all somewhat open drug trades and likely deal with an increased volume. In my rural area, I've seen 1 grow op in 8 years... and only because it caught fire.

Anyone in smaller cities/towns seeing this stuff?

It seems to me that the Yank's (even in rural areas) are dealing with significantly more volume of drug production / use related work.

It seems to me ( and I'm certainly no expert) that our U.S. counterparts tend to use larger lines especially at some of your "smaller" fires where we would use smaller lines: eg: vehicle fires.
It seems there are more aerials and quints in use in more rural locations. Hard to really tell but I've followed links to websites to see what some stations have.

I don't know if this is true because it came from a CAFS salesman BUT:

The U. S. is apparently WAY behind us in the use of CAFS; particularly in rural areas.

I should qualify that statement with the understanding that he was trying to get us to trade in our truck and he said the U.S. is a great market for used CAFS units because "they are only really starting to catch on now."

Again, this is what I have seen on the 'net and heard from ??reliable?? sources. I can't prove a dang thing

Kill It!

I think that someone needs to kill this thread before it grows.

Yep, theres a lot of differences between us and the Yanks, and the Aussies, and the Brits, and the Zulus etc.....
I'ts because we live in different countries and we are totally different cultures. That being said, some people would take advantage of this thread to cause dissention, so lets be smart.
Also, there are lots of other authorities on firefighting in the world other than the Americans, just because the U.S. is doing it doesnt mean its better.....97

First of all I have question to what RookieLZ posted CAFS... I have never heard of that before. I read the entire post and I think that it is a great post. What I think that the person starting this thread wanted to know what the different things that make up each countires fire service and what makes it unique. I am currently doing a research paper where I am comparing the different traditions and how other countires differ from the United States. I am not saying that the United States is better then another country. I am just simply saying that exploring to compare the different way that countires do the job. Think about it. I am a firefighter in America I just want to look and see how my brothers and sister of another country perform the job. See if we do anything the same or anything different.
I find this topic very intresting. Also it will help serve as a model to see if we are the same or very different. I know that the fire department is better and I will tell you that there has to be a fire service that is more evoled then the US. American firefighting to is different each and everyday. Something new comes out where you have to be protected from this and that. Like in the US volunteer companies take classes like firefighter 1 and 2. I would like to know if other countires like Canada have the same thing or something similar or something complete different. I am sorry if people don't agree but just think about the topic.
Stay Safe